Most game fish spend a significant portion of their lives feeding near the bottom of a body of water that serves as their home. Successful fisherman put their bait near the bottom since the likelihood of catching fish is greatly increased. Unfortunately, most game fish shy away from open, sandy bottoms that are easily fished by man and other predators. Game fish rather feed in rocky or obstructed areas that afford numerous hiding places from which to spring upon prey. Thus, catching large numbers of fish without losing too much tackle on submerged snags requires a great deal of skill.
In addition to losing tackle, fishermen loose time dealing with snags. Most will try to free their lures without breaking their fishing line. The effort made is usually proportional to the value of the lure at risk of loss, with expensive lures meriting considerable expenditures of time and manpower. Many altogether dry fishermen will enter the water to retrieve a snagged lure. Of course, losing a lure means that a fisherman must dig into his tackle box and make a time-consuming replacement.
Since time wasted on retrieving snagged lures is time that is diverted from fishing, some fishermen have proposed “snag-free” rigs for suspending lures at a fixed distance above the bottom of a body of water serving as game fish habitat. These rigs have included complex arrangements of fishhooks, floats, and sinkers, some of which are detachable when placed under great strain as when snagged. Because of their cumbersome nature and cost, these rigs have not seen widespread acceptance by fishermen.